Food | Places | Friendship

Café Mondo & Prose

After four long hours of lectures, we decided to visit Café Mondo and of course catch up on girl time….

Café Mondo, located on the east side of the entrance to the A&C Mall, is a little café cozily tucked in the courtyard of the mall between Honeysuckle and Coffee Lounge.

We had been anticipating its opening to try our taste buds on any number on their menu, so arriving at its large, welcoming glass entrance to meet busy attendants was our cue to head-on right in.

Pros

The interior is clean and minimalistic (which is essential for its limited square footage) and the wooden furniture gives the space a contemporary yet indigenous African feel.

The ambience is accentuated with a lovely soul-jazz playlist. If you’re a lover of the genre, you’d find yourself occasionally swaying or humming along to Horace Silver or Diana Krall

Both their carrot, ginger and pineapple juice and smoothie are authentically carrot, ginger and pineapple and go down with blissful ease without having to crunch on bits of fibre (Lol).

The WiFi is free and waiters are happy to provide details for its access making us quite productive during our time there.

Arisa enjoyed her espresso particularly because of the taste which she mentioned being quite surprised by as she was used to being served Nescafé (a household coffee brand) as opposed to actual blended coffee beans whenever she ordered an Espresso.

The price of the Espresso is comparatively cheaper than those served at nearby cafés.

Cons

We’d suggest to be greeted by a little more branding in the space; either on the walls, or tissue holders. They surely wouldn’t want their customers leaving with only a faint remembrance of where they’d enjoyed that great meal or tumbler of wine.

Although the minimalistic interior gives a clean and unclustered feel, it’s almost a little too spacious thus the most discrete of conversation echos throughout the room.

The table we sat at was quite rocky. We didn’t play Goldilocks to find which seat was just right! But they definitely must ensure that their furniture is sturdy.

As a coffeehouse, the menu should include a wider variety of delectables and baked goods. We were quite disappointed to find that they did not serve croissants or brownies or offer any more continental side dishes than jollof rice or french fries.

Conversation Starter – Women | Relationships | Self-Honesty

As the rain pelted heavily outside Café Mondo, we settled to a conversation on women – married and committed, who in discussing their relationships to third parties, often recourse to embellishing or making justification for what everyone around them knows to be an imbalanced or unhealthy union.

We discussed how some women, plagued by the consequences of unremitting, poor previous life choices, stencil, shade-in and decorate the not-so-pleasant, not-so-socially-acceptable excerpts of their life story and gather and collect any remainders, stuffing them in their bosom like a kayayo does the change gained from selling off her wares while tactfully balancing an olonka-full load on her head.

Metaphorically, such is the task of many women trapped in relationships that ended up to be false and unwarranted matrimonial arrangements when perhaps upon asking for a hand with the ‘load’, acknowledging that it exists, they would find that the fear of being judged or ostracised because of it, is only that – a fear.

As women, we are advised by women and on rare occasions men alike, to support each other. Although this is all well and true, this support is predicated on the need for women to be honest with themselves first about the areas of their lives that hurt the most and share these, with discretion, to other women they wish to impact.

Glossary:

Kayayo – The name given to women and girls from the Northern parts of Ghana who travel to the capital to find work as market porters

Olonka – Tins used by market women in Ghana in the absence of a scale.